Loaded Baked Potato Soup - Instant Pot

Who doesn't love loaded bake potato soup?  All hot and creamy, topped with a dollop of sour cream, shredded cheese and bacon. Serve it with a crusty loaf of bread and you've got yourself a really hearty meal.  I have made this soup in a crock pot several times and wondered if it could be done in the instant pot.  After checking out a couple of recipes, and a few trial runs, this one turned out to be not only the easiest, but the best.

Delicious, yummy loaded bake potato soup!

 Note: I got this recipe from www.belleofthekitchen.com
 She also has a video play by play on her site which is super helpful.

Ingredients:
2 Tablespoon butter
1 medium onion diced (or half bag of frozen chopped onions)
3 cloves of garlic minced (or a spoon full of diced jarred minced garlic)
3 cups of chicken broth
1 small can cream of chicken soup
4 large russet potatoes or 7-8 smaller russet potatoes chopped into 1 in cubes
1 1/2 teaspoons of seasoned salt 
   black pepper to taste
1 Tablespoon of flour
1 cup of milk
2 cups of shredded cheese (i used mild cheddar and a jack/cheddar mix)

Garnish:
Cooked bacon chopped up, or real bacon bits
Sour cream
Shredded cheddar cheese


Put 2 Tablespoon of butter into the Instant Pot and turn on "Saute" function.  Add in chopped onions and cook until soft (3-4 minutes). 

You gotta love the saute function!

Add in garlic and cook for an additional minute, making sure the garlic doesn't burn

Steamy garlic vision

Add in 3 cups of chicken broth, the small can of cream of chicken soup, stir

It's smelling pretty good right about now

Add in cubed potatoes, salt, pepper, to the pot.  Stir until well combined. 

Hey potatoes, are you really going to be fork-soft in 10 short minutes? Let's find out.

Place lid on the Instant Pot, turn the vent valve to "sealing" and cook on manual high pressure for 10 minutes.  

My instant pot with it's new pretty cover

Quick release the pressure.

What it looks like when you open the lid

Meanwhile, stir together the 1 tablespoon of flour and the 1 cup of milk with a whisk until it creates a slurry and set aside.  

I think it's easier to add the milk to the flour than the other way around

Once the steam is completely released and the pin has dropped, open the lid and add in the slurry.  Turn to pot to saute and cook the soup for 4-5 minutes, until thickened. 

Hey we're getting somewhere! I also used my Pampered Chef meat utensil to help mush up some of the poatoes.

Stir in the two cups of shredded cheese and stir until melted.

Everything is better with cheese.

 Cook until thickened. Taste and season at the end.

Seasoning is the key to non-bland soups.

Serve garnished with a dollop of sour cream, bacon chunks, and some extra cheddar cheese.  

Yummy loaded baked potato soup

Also a nice buttery crusty loaf of french break goes nicely as a "dipper" for the soup.

Activate smell-o-vision now.

Also toppings are key here, don't skimp!

The more the merrier!

My children are weird, well 2/3 of them are.  They don't like mashed potatoes, but they love french fries.  When my youngest said "What's for dinner" I told her it was "french fry soup with bacon"... and guess what? She bought it!  She had a whole bowl and proclaimed it "yummy"!  The middle child wasn't so fooled but I will still count this as a victory.  

The bread fell in, so sad we had to scoop it out - and devour it.

This was a very delicious and hearty week night dinner that the whole family enjoyed (minus one - there's always the one). I am always surprised how the instant pot cooks old school crock pot dishes in a flash.  You don't need all day to get all day flavor these days!  Hooray for science, and Instant Pots.

 Enjoy!!